Monday, Oct. 19, 1987

World Notes BRITAIN

Inside the meeting hall at the seaside resort of Blackpool, the feeling of jubilation was palpable. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and 4,000 representatives of her Conservative Party had gathered for the first annual party conference since rolling to victory at the polls last June for the third successive time. Declared Thatcher: "We now have a new Britain: confident, optimistic, sure of its economic strength."

Still, the delegates were not complacent. The theme of the annual conference was "Action for the Third Term," and there was much talk of finding ways to keep the Thatcher revolution from running out of steam. The Tories thus endorsed further cuts in taxes, tougher anticrime measures and new curbs on labor unions.